Who We Are

The Joint Implementation Network (JIN) was established in 1994 with the aim to create an information platform for the relatively new climate change concept of Joint Implementation (JI). Two years earlier JI had been included in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change as an instrument for greenhouse gas emissions trading between countries through projects. The platform was targeted at key players in JI projects, such as business community representatives, policy makers, knowledge centers, and consultants. The core activity of the network was the publication of the Joint Implementation Quarterly,which first issue was presented at the first Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC (Berlin, 1995).

Climate Change

After that JIN developed into a knowledge center and provided advise to governments and business on how to become involved in greenhouse gas emission reduction products, first, during the Activities Implemented Jointly (AIJ) pilot phase (during 1996-2000), second, under the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and JI after 1997 and, third, after the start of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme in 2005. For example, for the Netherlands Government JIN took part in the establishment of the Dutch JI programme ERUPT and in 2001 JIN revised the JI project Guidelines for this programme. Another example is the study on "Guidance for UK Emissions Trading Projects" carried out for the UK government in co-operation with the University of Surrey and the University of Sussex.

In addition, JIN has been involved in a number of EU-funded projects under, among others, the Fifth and Sixth Framework Programmes, Pro-Eco Asia, and SYNERGY. These projects concerned both research on conceptual issues related to CDM and JI project accounting and capacity building support in developing countries for CDM project identification, management and related technology transfer.

Recently, JIN has also developed a portfolio of activities related to calculating the greenhouse emission reductions when considering investments in low-carbon technologies. For instance, JIN wrote the Project Design Document for the Hidroelektrica JI Track I project in Romania, which was approved by the Romanian National Committee on Climate Change in February 2009. In addition, JIN has calculated for a number of organizations the greenhouse gas benefits of using biomass for energy production, by considering the full life cycle of a technology application (feedstock processing, energy production, energy consumption).

Energy (and climate change)

Closely related to the issue of climate change, but also independently, JIN has since the year 2000 worked a lot on energy market issues. For the Gasunie (the Dutch Gas Union) JIN carried out several studies on issues such as 'security of supply of natural gas' against the backdrop of European energy market liberalization. This included scenario-analyses for, among others, International Gas Union.

Activities which have both a strong sustainable energy and climate change policy component are:

The preparation of the Handbook for Conducting Technology Needs Assessment for Climate Change (together with Edinburgh University and Stockholm Environment Institute) for UNDP and UNFCCC.

The participation in the European SKEP-EMPIRE project which focused on low-carbon technology in built environment.

The study project on Non-ETS Offset projects for the Netherlands Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and Environment, together with Arcadis. This study has combined the technology and climate challenge which results from the EU climate energy targets for 2020 by suggesting project opportunities in sectors not covered by the EU emissions trading scheme which both reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and support development of low-carbon technologies.